Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger
by Shakespeare's Lemonade
Summary: We are only human, but we are expected to perform far beyond human capacity. So, we do. Our work is never over. Series of team related oneshots because I wanted to write something for a friend's birthday.
1. Part I: Our Work is Never Over

"Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger"

Shakespeare's Lemonade

Rating: T

Genre: Action/Friendship/Hurt/Comfort

Summary: We are only human, but we are expected to perform far beyond human capacity. Our work is never over.

A/N: This story was inspired by the Daft Punk song of the same name. Some of the chapters will be related to each other, and some of them won't, but they will all relate to the main theme.

I am posting it in honor of a friend's birthday which was a few days ago. So, happy birthday to Rurrlock-God of Power!

* * *

**_Part I: Our Work is Never Over_**

I don't like to admit it when I'm tired. I can hide it for a long time. But when the only people around me are starting to look like the zombies in those new movies I'm always being made to watch, I'm not so intent on appearing in control.

Really, it looks like the only thing keeping Tony on his feet is that suit. I'm afraid once it's off, he'll fall flat on his face. On another day, that might be kind of funny, but right now, I need to make sure everyone makes it safely to bed because I have a feeling that wherever they fall is where they will stay for the next twelve hours or so.

And Tony isn't the worst of them. I think Bruce is normally the most drained of all of us after a long day (or days). He's a little older than the others, and when he's in his normal human form, he doesn't have the endurance of his green counterpart. I see him fall on the couch, and I figure it's safe to leave him there.

Clint and Natasha are a lot like me. They don't act tired, even though I know they are. I know because they aren't as strong as I am, and I'm exhausted. They are the first to disappear off to their rooms.

Thor doesn't look as tired as I feel, but I know even he gets worn out like the rest of us. I can tell by the way he carries his hammer. It doesn't swing back and forth as much as usual. And he becomes uncharacteristically subdued.

I'm not entirely sure how we fell into this routine, and I don't think anyone has noticed the way I always make sure everyone is where they should be. I like it that way. Most times, they don't give me much trouble. Today seems to be the exception. I can't exactly remember what today is, though.

For some reason, Tony sits in one of the big arm chairs, suit and all. Last time that happened, it took me two hours to get him out of it. He told me not to bother, but it seemed wrong to leave him like that. And since I don't want a repeat performance, I take the liberty of sorting it out.

"JARVIS, can you get Mr. Stark out of his suit?" I say.

"Not while he's sitting down, Captain," comes the reply.

"Why are you talking about me as if I'm not here?" Tony grumbles at me.

"You might as well not be." I move across the room and grab ahold of his arm. "Come on. I'm not letting you fall asleep in this thing again."

"Why don't you let me take care of that?" Tony stands up anyway and sort of stumbles toward the wall as it opens up to dismantle his suit. "You know," he says, as the machine starts working, "you take all the fun out of crashing after a hard day's work."

I shake my head. "I've never understood that term. Why would anyone _want_ to crash?"

"I am to tired to explain 21st century slang to you right now."

"Thank goodness. Go to bed, Stark."

"You know if you're not careful, we'll start calling you 'mom'."

I ignore him as I head down the hallway toward my own quarters, thinking how nice it will be not to have to hear that voice or any other for a long time.

**.A.**

JARVIS wakes me up two hours later. "Captain Rogers, you are needed in the common area," he says.

"What is it?" I ask, hearing the sleep still coating my voice.

"Mr. Stark received a call from Director Fury about half an hour ago."

I roll out of bed and put on clean clothes as quickly as possible. "What took him so long?" I wonder out loud.

By the time I get to the main room, the others have gathered, and even Bruce looks sort of awake with a large mug of coffee in front of him. Tony is rattling off information that I sort of hear. Robots in Queens. I know I've probably said this before, but what is this world coming to?

Strategies are planned, and I take off with Clint and Natasha in one of the Quinjets, which I have learned to fly, thank you very much. Not that I particularly like it, but I don't let anyone know.

This has become our habit. Tony and Thor both seem to enjoy flying on their own, and Bruce prefers taking the streets. It allows us all to come at the enemy from different angles which works in our favor most of the time anyway.

We're not the most organized group. Most of us aren't anyway, though I will not name names. But somehow, we make this work. Anyone who says we aren't a good team has never actually had to work with someone they didn't get along with. Compared to how it started out, we get along great now.

I've learned to tell when Tony is serious and when he's teasing. I still don't always like it, but it's okay.

Clint and Natasha have lightened up a bit, and they follow me without question. It kind of scares me.

Thor is... different, but he's a good guy, and he genuinely wants to help. He can do things none of us can imagine, but he doesn't try to take the reins of an operation. I don't know why he follows me when he could rule the world if he wanted to. Guess that's just it; he doesn't want that.

Bruce is smarter than all of us, even Tony in my opinion, but he always lets me or Tony make the decisions. Sometimes it's like pulling teeth to get him to share his opinion, but when he does, I wonder why he's not leading this thing. Guess it's the other guy he's still worried about.

We are a team. Yeah, we're kind of a mess sometimes, a chemical reaction waiting to happen, but I can't see us being any other way. We're so human in our own ways. But we're expected to perform far beyond human capacity. So, we do. Our work is never over.

**.A.**

Last thing I remember, I was jumping through the air, my shield aimed at the robot's head. Now, I feel something rough against my face, and my entire body feels like it's on fire. I don't know what happened or where I am. When I try to move, pain reverberates everywhere, originating from my stomach, I think. Feels like I got thrown in a wood chipper. I'm not sure what that feels like, but I'm pretty sure it would be like this.

Opening my eyes, I see gray pavement and ash, I'm lying face down on the street. The noises of battle around me seem very far away, but there's a strange ringing in my ears. I can't move without the pain threatening to knock me out again, so I can't figure out what's wrong.

I decide there must be a piece of shrapnel in my stomach. Or several pieces, I can't tell. I'm leaning toward my left side, so I can move my right arm, but when I try to touch the area, the pain flares up worse, and I can't feel much with my gloves on anyway.

I close my eyes. What I can see of the world is spinning anyway, and I feel like I might throw up. The thought makes me slow my breathing and focus on keeping my stomach contents where they belong. I've gotten a lot better at that since my days as a human punching bag. Though right now, that's what I feel like.

I try to hear what's going on around me. Everything seems even further away than before. I can't get a good idea of my location based on that. I try to hear the sounds of my teammates fighting, but it all blends together, and I feel a sharp pain behind my eyes from the concentration.

So, I try to relax. It's not easy with my face in the pavement, and the new sensation of blood dripping down my neck. I'm not sure where it's coming from. It trails down to my chin and drips onto the pavement. It's constant like a heartbeat.

Something must have hit an artery.

I try to move again, using my left arm to steady myself. I manage to roll onto my left side, but I'm pretty sure I can't remember my own name right now. I'm breathing too heavily; it's making things worse. The blood is dripping faster, and I feel air movement stinging the exposed injuries I can't number.

I use my teeth to remove the glove on my right hand. It hurts to move my arm like that, but everything hurts. With my fingers free, I carefully feel along my side to determine what kind of injuries I have. All I feel is sticky, warm blood and pain.

And there's a lot of blood.

I close my eyes again, wondering how long it will take someone to find me, if anyone will at all. I wonder if I'll always be this alert in near death situations. Or if I can even _be_ in near death situations. The old me would have passed out or died by now. Probably died.

Here I lie, wide awake, but unable to move, or call for help. No one would hear me, and it wouldn't be worth the jarring pain. I figure they'll notice I'm missing eventually. Maybe once they've taken out all the robots. It started out as a bit of a challenge, but we were able to deal with them pretty easily once we figured out that their weak spot was the back of the head. That's what I was going for when this happened.

I wonder how much time has passed, if I've been here for hours or only the time I can remember. I'm not sure how long that's been. I try to remember the moment I returned to awareness, and I can't. It's as if I've always been here.

Time is still passing, evidenced by the constant _drip, drip, drip_ right by my ear, but I can't focus enough to count the seconds. I try opening my eyes to see how big the pool has become, but it feels like someone is shining a floodlight in my face, and I realize I probably have a concussion.

At this point, I decide to evaluate my chances of getting out of this. I don't think these injuries can kill me, but I've never really tested how badly I can be hurt and still live. If I were a normal person, I probably would have bled to death by now.

Suddenly, I feel a choking sensation. I tasted blood, and I can't breathe. I have to cough, and as I do, the stabbing, burning pain in my stomach erases any other senses I might still have. My throat burns, and the rusty taste coats my mouth. I feel the gritty asphalt under my lips, and the pool of blood smears across my face.

Then I hear something. The noises around me have always been too far to distinguish, but this is much closer. It's the sound of flight stabilizers and a voice.

"Cap?"


	2. Part II: Make it Better

_**I thought I would post this now because I left you all on a cliffhanger last time. This chapter wraps up the first "episode," and the chapters after this will be focusing on other things. I think Chapters 3 and 4 will be about Clint and Natasha respectively. I'm still working on that.**_

_**If anyone has any requests or ideas of what they want to see, feel free to let me know. I can always use your stray thoughts. :D  
**_

_**Finally, thanks to all those who have reviewed and the awesome number of alerts. I really appreciate it. Keep 'em coming!  
**_

_**Part II: Make it Better**_

I would know his voice anywhere. It has sort of a whining tone to it. In a good way, if that's possible. I don't open my eyes, and he must think I'm unconscious, because next thing I know, he's trying to lay me on my back while checking my pulse.

"Don't," I say, and speaking hurts more than anything else so far. I take a deeper breath, though not actually _deep_ because that would be stupid.

"Um..." I've never heard Tony sound hesitant before. It must be really bad. But I knew that. "Do you realize that there's a piece of—I don't know what that is—sticking out of you?" He sounds worried.

I mumble something that isn't really words because I had a feeling there was something like that, but I didn't know for sure, and right now, I'm focusing on keeping my composure. Or just not screaming.

"Hey! Cap?" His voice is too loud. It hurts. He wants me to open my eyes and say something, but I really don't want to.

Finally, I force myself to peel back my eyelids a tiny bit. "I hear you," I say.

"Okay." Tony's moving around, and I'm not sure what he's doing, but he isn't touching me, so I don't care. "Listen," he says. "You're in pretty bad shape. We've got EMS on the way. I'll stay with you until they get here."

"You don't have to." I know there must be so much to do with the cleanup, and Tony usually heads up that endeavor. I'll be okay on my own.

"I don't think they'd be able to find you," Tony says, and I hear an artificial joking in his tone. "If I hadn't been looking for you, I would have assumed you were some poor civilian who got in the robots' way—and got pulverized."

"Not that bad," I say, but I really have no idea. I think it's more just to say something.

"Yes it is. Have you seen yourself?"

"My neck," I say.

"What?"

"Itches." It actually tickles, but I wasn't going to say that. The blood is still dripping, even though I'm lying on my back now, which is otherwise much more comfortable. But blood is trailing down the side of my neck and dripping off when it reaches the base of my skull.

"Hang on a second," Tony says. I hear a mechanical noise. Something to do with his suit, and then I feel something soft wiping the blood away. As he gets closer to the source, I realize it must be a wound on my shoulder. It just didn't hurt as badly as my stomach, so I didn't notice it.

And then I start coughing again, and something is holding me up so I don't choke on my own blood, and in the middle of it, I somehow lose awareness.

**.A.**

I wake to a steady sound, not completely unlike the constant dripping I remember, but this is more artificial. Like a computer beeping. I realize quickly that it's a heart monitor, and it's hooked up to me.

My eyes feel sticky as I open them, like waking from the ice. Only it's not at all like that because the first thing I see is Natasha sitting in a chair beside the bed I'm in. She looks tired, but otherwise quite her usual self. Though I do begin to question why she's here.

"You're awake," she says, seeming fully aware that she is stating the obvious.

"Yeah," I say, because I honestly can't think of anything else. My mouth is dry, and I still taste the faint flavor of blood.

"You've been out since yesterday." Natasha starts explaining before I ask. "Well, I guess that would be the day before yesterday now. You had a big piece of shrapnel in your stomach, and several little pieces in other places. I can show you the charts."

"That's fine," I say. "As long as it's all out."

"Yeah, it's out. Took them long enough."

I sense a tone of annoyance covering one of worry, but I don't really want to pry into that right now. Natasha is not known for showing concern, even for the people she cares about. At least, I think she cares about us.

"Stark's gonna be mad you woke up while he was gone," Natasha says.

"What? Why?" I can't imagine him caring about something like that.

Natasha speaks almost offhandedly. "Oh, he wanted to stay, but they needed him and Thor to help with cleanup. They should be about done now."

"He was worried about me?"

"I didn't say that. If he asks, I didn't say it, okay?"

"Why would he ask?"

"Because I might have made some comment about him worrying, and he got all defensive like he always does. So, you didn't hear it from me."

"Okay...?" I say. I'm confused now, but I'm pretty sure that's because I'm on enough pain medication to kill an elephant from all the needles in my arms.

"Anyway, he should be back soon," Natasha says. "Clint took Dr. Banner home this afternoon."

"Is he okay?"

"Yeah, just really worn out from all the hulking out he's done lately. He stayed in the hospital overnight after we finished with the robots. They gave him a bunch of vitamins and stuff. He seems fine now."

"You can go," I say.

She shakes her head. "It's no trouble. I'll stay until Stark gets back and go home with Thor. I have a feeling he'll be hungry."

I laugh, and it hurts. But it's not like before. I feel stitches and dull throbbing, not the mind-numbing pain I felt before. I suppose I'm healing faster than normal people, but I have actually gotten used to it.

**.A.**

I'm able to go home the next day. Apparently, Tony came when I was asleep, and I missed him because the next thing I know, Clint is there to take me back to the tower. I'm under strict orders to take it easy, which I don't mind. The Avengers are officially out of service for a while to recuperate from the last week or so. I can't actually remember how long it's been.

When I get home, I eat, though not as much as I want to because I seem to have some broken ribs in addition to all the shrapnel wounds. The best I can figure is that robot must have caught me in the air and thrown me down the street where I collected all my injuries as I slid to a stop where Tony found me.

After eating, I decide to walk around for a while. Nothing strenuous. I've been lying down for the past three days, and that gets to me. I know I'll probably go to bed early, but until then I have nothing to do. That feeling is very foreign to me.

As I wander the halls of Stark Tower or Avengers Tower or whatever it is, I find that I am able to relax. Being home and knowing that everyone else is okay makes it better. I don't know exactly when this became home, but I'll take it.

When I reach the end of a hallway, I hear someone working in the next room, which is strange because that's Tony's workshop, and from what I could surmise, he just got home early this morning. He should be sleeping. Not that he tends to do what he should, but it worries me when he gets like this. Not that I've ever told him that.

As I enter the room, I can see him making repairs on the latest suit damage he incurred. I might be mistaken, but it looks like he's wearing the same clothes as when we left to fight the robots. My suspicion is confirmed as I come closer and see that the right sleeve of his shirt is stained dark red.

"Is that mine?" I ask.

He looks up, surprised and confused. Then he sees where I'm looking and lifts up his hand. "Yeah. You lost a lot of that. Ever think about donating blood? You'd be a perfect candidate."

He's deflecting the conversation before I can even ask, but I do anyway. "Have you slept at all?"

"What? Of course."

"In the last three days, I mean?"

He looks up at the ceiling, as of counting. "Not as such." He turns to go back to his work.

"You should sleep," I say a little more forcefully.

"I hate sleeping in the daytime. I'll be fine until tonight."

"You work too hard."

"Says the workaholic himself."

"Okay, how about a compromise?"

He looks at me again. "What are you offering?"

"We both take it easy, go downstairs and watch some baseball or something."

"I don't like baseball."

"Okay, then, something you do like."

We were already heading toward the elevator. "Have you seen _Star Wars_ yet?"

"No," I say. "I don't think I'd like it, but for you, I'll give it a try."

We get on the elevator and he presses the button. "Because you think you should do me a favor after you've almost died?" He looks at me as if he expects a real answer.

"I did not almost die."

"Yes you did." He stares at the elevator doors as the open. "Did no one tell you that?"

We walk out into the common area, and I'm not sure if I should take him seriously or just ignore it. But then he continues talking as he sets up the TV. I sit down and listen.

"When you got to the hospital, they thought you were a goner. Once they got the random pieces of blown up stuff out of you, of course, you started healing like nobody's business, but before that, you almost died."

Tony sits beside me on the couch. He sort of sighs, but it's hard to imagine him really sighing. The opening credits on the movie begin to roll with the loud music behind them.

"I'm sorry," I say quietly.

Tony pauses the movie and turns to face me. "What the hell are you apologizing for?"

I have no idea. It just seemed like a safe thing to say. "Nothing, I guess." I shrug, and hope he'll drop it, but he just keeps staring at me. "I'm sorry you were worried about me." There, I said it.

"What makes you think I was worried." He doesn't deny it.

"You felt the need to point out that I almost died. If you're trying to tell me to be careful, I will."

"No." He shakes his head. "I'm trying to tell you that we need to have a long talk with Fury about appropriate rest periods between missions so nothing like this ever happens again."

I nod. I had been thinking the same thing in the back of my mind. "Okay," I say.

"Good." He nods back at me and turns on the movie again. "Now pay attention."


	3. Part III: Hour After

**I'm kind of writing my own history for Clint to fit my little agenda here. I suppose you could consider it AU, but the movies haven't really given us anything on him, and I only read about the comics on Wikipedia. My version will be... different.**

**This chapter is also in Clint's POV**** which turned out a lot better than I thought it would.**_**  
**_

_**Part III: Hour After**_

There are no clouds in the sky today. I haven't noticed things like that in a long time. I remember the last day that looked like this though. It was weird. I was in Afghanistan. I had shot three people the day before. Assassinated. I was—I am good at it.

I had been back at base all of an hour when I got the call. My CO wanted to see me. Urgent. I thought it was another mission.

I don't see any birds flying over me. No movement whatsoever. Only the smooth blue canvas, empty of all life. It's a familiar feeling.

We're in a forest, which is new for the team, but not for me and a few others. I'm lying on the prickly ground. There's a bunch of pine needles digging into my shoulder, but that's the least of my worries because there's a splintered bough jutting out of my left leg. I think it's gone all the way through, but I can't tell.

I'm thinking about falling asleep to that blue sky. It seems like a good idea at the moment. Like that day under the clear Afghanistan sky. Like the day I hopped on a plane to fly home to no one. Maybe this is my final journey home. Maybe when I open my eyes again, I'll see the ones I lost that day.

No such luck.

My blue sky is obscured by a large figure. It's really a talent the way this guy can block out the sun. But even the sight of his face and the thought that I might actually make it out of this alive can't block out the thoughts I was having before he showed up, and I realize I'm going to have to ask him a huge favor.

"Barton, you hear me?" he says.

Has he been talking to me? I don't know. "Yeah."

He's kneeling beside me, looking at my leg. I can see the look on his face, and now I'm sure this guy's had to deal with far more blood in his lifetime than anyone ever should. Which makes what I'm about to say kind of adding insult to injury.

"Hey Steve," I say.

"Yeah?" He's not really paying attention.

"There's something I need to ask you."

"Save it," he says.

He thinks I'm delirious or something. "No, I can't." I really can't. I've been saving it for too many years already, and the opportunity to spill my guts is just too good to pass up, you know? I mean, metaphorically. Not the tree branch in my leg. No one wants that.

"Listen, Steve," I say. "There's something I need you to do. In two days, got that?"

"Yeah, two days."

He's still not paying attention. I try to sit up, but he pushes me back down, and a guy can't really argue with the force of Captain America's shove. It wasn't really a shove, but it felt like one.

"Steve," I say it a little louder, and I'm gritting my teeth, because damn that hurts. What is he doing, twisting it around in there?

"Gimme a minute, Clint," he says a little softer this time. Maybe he is paying attention.

I give him a minute. He's quieter than usual, which is saying a lot, and it makes me think I'm worse off than he wants to admit.

"It's been a minute," I say. And I don't wait for him to reply. "I need to to go to the cemetery in two days. It's the anniversary. I need you to take yellow roses. I hate yellow roses, but she loves them, so that's what it has to be. I know it's a lot to ask, but if I can't go, someone needs to. Oh, and Molly doesn't like flowers, but I'm sure she'd get a kick out of you being there."

There's a brief silence. "Barton, who are you talking about?"

Of course no one told him. Natasha is the only one on the team who knows, and she wouldn't. Fury and Coulson know, but they tend to leave out such details. It's funny, now that I think of it, I think this is the sort of thing Cap would want to know.

"My family," I say. "I don't want to miss the anniversary, but I might not make it."

"You'll be fine. I'm gonna get you to safety, and you can hobble out to the cemetery yourself."

"But if I can't. If I'm stuck in a hospital or something, will you go for me?"

I know I'm being insistent, but I can't waver on this. It's the only thing I have left, and I'm not giving it up. I'm not letting them take it away.

I see him nodding and the sunlight reflecting off his golden hair. Maybe I am delirious. "I'll go," he says. Then he lifts me like I'm a sack of potatoes and carries me deeper into the trees.

**.A.**

I must have passed out before help came because I'm in a field hospital, and I'm not sure why we have a field hospital right now, but there must have been more injuries. The Army got involved, and there may have been civilians hurt as well.

The pain isn't any less than it was before. It's probably more because someone finally ripped that pine bough out of my leg. I can see the white bandages wrapped around it, the small bloodstain beginning to soak through.

My head feels hazy from anesthesia and pain medication as I try to sit up. I can see other cots around me with many more injured people. There are doctors and nurses running around, and there's a canvas tent overhead.

There's nowhere for me to go, so I lie back down. There's a dull throbbing in my head now, probably from moving too quickly. I close my eyes and listen to the hushed voices and the sounds outside of trucks and soldiers. It's familiar and comforting in a way most people would never understand.

It's when I hear voices closer to me, familiar ones, that I open my eyes again. A little ways down the row of beds, I see Steve talking to a doctor. Arguing is more like it. I can't quite here what they're saying, but when it's over, Steve seems to have won. That's not all that surprising.

He comes over to me once the doctor wanders off. "Feeling better?" he asks.

"Better than what?" I say. My mouth feels like it's full of sand.

"Than falling out of a tree."

I had hoped no one saw that. "Yeah, I guess. Hurts like hell, but I'll get over it."

"That's the spirit." He smiles, and I can't help thinking he's planning something, which is odd because I'm used to seeing that look from other, more sneaky members of the team not Cap.

"What's going on?" I ask.

"We're leaving in about ten minutes," he says.

"Leaving where?"

"We've only got about six hours of daylight left, and you have somewhere to be."

He leaves, and for a second, I can't figure out what he means. Then it all comes back to me. All the things I said to him when I was probably suffering a concussion. I told him about my family. I didn't tell people those things. I must have thought I was going to die or something if I told him any of it.

But now he knows. There's no taking it back, and I don't really want to. I close my eyes and I see blue sky. I'm flying, and nothing can touch me.

I've got to ask them what kind of painkillers they have me on.

**.A.**

Exactly ten minutes later, Steve shows up with a wheelchair. He helps me sit up, and normally, I would dislike that very strongly, but he's Steve, and you can't really be mad at the guy. Unless you're Tony Stark, and everyone knows he's unreasonable.

Steve takes me to one of the Quinjets that's already running. Natasha is in the pilot's seat, but it's just the three of us. I wonder if Steve talked to her about what I said. He must have. It doesn't matter because she already knows the whole story. She's the only one who does.

Steve again helps me into one of the seats and straps me in. Then he joins Natasha in the cockpit, and I wonder if he's giving me space or avoiding a potentially uncomfortable conversation. Or both. I'm fine with it either way. I like the quiet.

It takes us over an hour to get back to the city, and it isn't terribly comfortable having my leg constantly bounced around with Natasha's "driving." I'm hoping she's not taking us the whole way.

My wish is granted when I see that we've landed back at the tower. Tony built a landing pad for the Quinjets a while back which makes traveling for missions a lot easier. Today, it makes coming home easier.

Once the jet is secured, we go inside. There's a bouquet of yellow roses on the counter waiting for us. I can't say anything to that, but no one seems to be expecting much conversation. Steve picks up the flowers, and I see him scribble something on a scrap of paper. It looks like is says "Thanks Pepper."

Then we head to the elevator and down to the ground floor. The ride feels almost as long as the trip here. We had been upstate trying to take down a stronghold of mad scientists intent on taking over the world. Mad scientists with highly advanced weaponry, that is. There's no way I would have fallen out of a tree if it hadn't literally been blown away underneath me.

Once we get to the main floor, there's a car waiting. Pepper is in the driver's seat. Natasha opens the back door and Steve helps me in. It takes longer since the backseat of a sedan is a lot harder to get into that the open bay of a Quinjet.

Once I'm in, Steve folds the wheelchair and puts it in the trunk. Then he gets in across from me, and he looks like a kid who just hit a growth spurt with his knees jammed into the back of the driver's seat. It almost makes me laugh.

Pepper's driving is much smoother that Natasha's, even in the city, and I've never been more grateful for good driving. It's a little weird to be in a car with three other people and no one's saying a word. I get it though. No one knows what to say. I don't either.

We finally arrive at the cemetery. I don't remember telling Steve which one it was, but I'm sure he had Pepper look it up or something. After the complexities of getting out of the car, Steve stands beside me, staring at the ground. I look down and see what he sees. It rained recently.

"I don't think the wheels will go on the grass," I say. If I could walk right now, I would. I made it this far though, and Steve can go the rest of the way for me like I asked him too. I can see the headstone in the distance. I know just which one it is. I start to point it out, when Steve grabs my arm.

I shake my head. "I can't." It's more painful to admit almost than it's worth, but I know I can't make it, even with help. "I can't walk."

"You don't have to," Steve says. And he pulls me up as if I weigh nothing. He puts my arm over his shoulders, and with one of his arms, he half carries me across the grass. I had never thought about it until now, just how strong he is. I mean, I've always known he was strong. He's Captain America. But here he is carrying me across the cemetery when he really doesn't have to.

We reach the spot I've come to on the same day every year for the last seven. Has it been seven? It feels like yesterday in a lot of ways. It's hard to imagine I've lived this life separate from them. I could never have accepted the idea back then. I remember when it was a struggle to get out of bed, to eat, to keep breathing.

It's not anymore. It's not hard to see why I'm still here and why I had to lose them. I'm stronger than I was then, and that's why I find myself crying into Steve's shoulder. I couldn't have done that seven years ago.

It doesn't last long. It's just a moment of letting go that I've needed for so long. Then Steve lays the roses in front of Mary's grave.

"I have a feeling she'd be glad you're here," I say. "I know Molly would be jumping up and down at the sight of Captain America. She was a tomboy. Probably a lot more like me than her mother."

"I'm glad you told me about them," Steve says.

I nod. "Me too. I wouldn't be here if not for you."

There's no need to follow that, and we fall into silence for the remainder of our time there. We stay until the sun sets, and it's hard to see. My head is pounding, and my leg is killing me but I've just had one of the best days of my life since I lost my family seven years ago.

This time, I'm not going home to no one. I'm going back to a team, a family, that loves me, even if they are afraid to admit it. We prove it though, ever time we fight for each other. Today, Steve, Natasha, and even Pepper proved it to me. Maybe we didn't need to say it out loud. Maybe this was something we just felt in silence the way Steve carried me and stood beside me.

The sky is black as we drive home, but I know the sun is gonna rise in the morning, and my life is gonna be just fine.

* * *

**Sorry about the wait on this one. I was distracted by other shiny things. The next chapter is going to focus on Natasha, though I think it will be in Steve's POV again. I also haven't decided what I'm doing with Thor and Bruce. I think I may want to do a chapter focusing on Pepper as well. So, let me know if you guys have any ideas for that.**


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